Tonight’s pre-season friendly, which sees West Ham take on Wolverhampton Wanderers in Jacksonville, has take something of a back seat amidst the recent transfer speculation.
However, the match marks an important milestone in the progress the Hammers have made during the early days of Julen Lopetegui’s short reign.
West Ham’s new Spanish head coach faces his former club in the third match of our pre-season campaign and West Ham can expect a significant step up in the quality of the opposition.
While many of us have had our favourite players during the slightly less competitive first two games, the fixture against Wolves will provide a better opportunity to see who J-Lo has in mind before our Premier League opener.
Tonight’s game presents a huge opportunity for Michail Antonio. The Hammers forward was coveted by Lopetegui during his brief spell at the Midlands club, so it will be intriguing to see how he handles the situation.
With West Ham seemingly unable to sign a striker despite our best efforts, it remains highly likely that Antonio will lead the line at the beginning of the season, at least. Maxwel Cornet, Calum Marshall, and Danny Ings have all done their best in pre-season, but none have really convinced as the target man the team clearly needs.
Whilst tonight’s game may just be another pre-season friendly, it will hold more importance for some players than others. Tonight is a chance for Antonio to not only impress but also to bring the kind of pace, athleticism, and physicality needed at the focal point of the team.
As West Ham edges closer to the start of the season, we should begin to see more clearly what Lopetegui’s team and tactics will look like.
I honestly think we still need another player I’m every single position on the pitch except.maybe right wing, fabianski is past it, no idea why we really signed foderingham, areolas number 1 but is also getting on a bit, coufal is not ideal but I suppose we could survive with him as first choice for another season, but I’d much rather we signed someone else and had him as back up to sell next season, Kilman and Mavropanos are the only 2 centre backs I have any faith in, so ideally need another 2 to provide cover and rotation, Creswell should have been sold years ago so we need a young back up to Emerson, soucek has been going down hill a lot, ward prowse is good but quite one dimensional, alvarez is by far and away our beat midfielder but also one dimensional, so 2 maybe 3 more midfielders, soucek replacement with him as back up and then either a back up or replacement for jwp and back up for alcarez, right wing is alright, kudus and bowen are our best players, and i reckon guilherme will come good but is still raw, depends what formation were gonna play but cam we have paqueta (maybe) and also kudus, so depending where we want to play kudus maybe someone there, we have no left winger at all so probably need 2 and antonio and ings should both be no where near the first team.. literally 11 players still needed